Doorway to Murder

by Carol Pouliot

Published by Level Best Books Cover art by Sean Eike

Time Travel Mystery Novels were outside my comfort zone, until now. Carol Pouliot has opened up a whole new literary vista to me, one in which a murder mystery is skilfully blended with science fiction. I’m very pleased to have selected Doorway to Murder as my introduction to this fascinating fusion genre. The yarn is spun with subtlety and care as our master word weaver weaves her tapestry of history, mystery, love and time travel. Pouliot uses time travel for a serious look at how people connect with each other.

The author expertly piques the curiosity of not only one of her protagonists, aptly named Olivia Watson who dwells in the present (2014), but the reader’s as well when an intruder awakens Watson from peaceful slumber only to disappear through a wall, or so she thinks. You are, within the first two pages, inexorably drawn into the first mystery to find out who this strange prowler is and why does he only peer into the darkness of her bedroom at her then leave?

And, as if this wasn’t enough of an enigma, you are suddenly witness to a bank robbery and a murder. It’s a blustery winter’s morning in 1934 and Detective Sergeant Steven Blackwell is having breakfast with his good friend and partner, Detective Harry Beckman when all of a sudden Officer Jimmy Bourgogne bursts into the diner. In a flap, the officer proclaims to the two detectives that a pillar of the community has just been found murdered in the bank vault of the branch he manages.

The case is one swirling in an insidious sea of period chauvinism combined with liberal measures of lust, envy, pride and an extra measure of avarice. Grim debilitating tension builds as DS Blackwell is confronted with more suspects than he can shake an ebony stick at. His refusal to compromise in his pursuit of the truth sets him adrift in a perilous and tempestuous sea of mystery and treachery of the worst kind.

He soon realizes he no longer knows who he can trust. Blackwell has no idea that a glimpse into his mother’s bedroom will completely transform his seemingly ordinary life and also give him someone to cling to, a sea anchor in a storm tossed sea of emotion.

Carol Pouliot is brilliant at creating a sense of realism so powerful you will feel the biting cold of winter winds and feathery snowflakes landing and melting on your face as you trudge through snowdrifts. She truly is a master of her craft.

“Doorway to Murder” challenged my purist notion that you can’t mix science fiction with a good mystery. Carol Pouliot has risen to the challenge and without doubt, taken the genre to a new level. I can’t wait to open the cover on, Threshold of Deceit, to discover where Olivia’s and Steven’s experiments in time travel take them not to mention what new mystery Steven will be embroiled in.

James D. A. Terry